1
looks like through 1 quarter the Hawks are having success running the ball and probably not enough :) Is this the first lightning delay in Seattle history?
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Q. Who do you like, Anquan Boldin vs the Seahawks secondary?
A. On the one hand, there's a real tendency for great receivers to provide a geometric effect when joining a great offense that lacked one. Remember Randy Moss' 25-odd touchdowns and Tom Brady's 50?
You get the idea that Boldin's going to do something like that -- or that Kapernick and Gore are going to run wild if teams overplay Boldin. (You got the idea that Percy Harvin would have done the same. SIIIIIii-iiiiggg-ghhhhh!)
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On the other hand, historically speaking... great secondaries tend to shut down great receivers. It didn't matter who the 1972 Dolphins' secondary played. It didn't matter who Lester Hayes and Mike Haynes played. With secondaries like this, it doesn't even matter (that much) whether they have a great pass rush; those secondaries create pass rushes, through the freedom to blitz.
That near pick by Richard Sherman on Steve Smith week 1? That was ASTOUNDING. I couldn't believe he touched the ball ... and he got two hands to it! The Panthers were well-and-truly horrified; I never noticed Smith line up near Sherman again.
I'll take the Seahawks' secondary at 2:1 odds to hold down the 9'ers passing game.
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Q. Teams are now setting a linebacker to mark the Read Option and blast the QB. Are Wilson's and Lynch's rampaging days over?
A. And, of course, teams are compromising the pass defense horribly. It's exactly as though the linebacker (1) bites on every play action, and (2) TELLS you he's going to bite on every play action. (?!)
It's not feasible. Not in the long term.
In the short term, guys like Kapernick and Wilson will rack up 300, 400 yards a game. Hey, this is the year 2013: back in 1972, you could be so good at one thing that defenses couldn't stop it. Larry Csonka was like that. But in 2013, the level of athlete out there, sure. You can stop ANY one thing you want to stop.
Last week, Carolina wanted to stop Lynch. What do Seattle and San Francisco want to stop? We have no idea. The chess game changes week-to-week.
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Q. Any Secret Factor Hot Sheet Tips on the SSI game program?
A. 3rd-down conversion is one of my 5 favorite sabermetric NFL stats (along with turnover ratio, number of incompletions, yardage and yardage per play). 3rd-down conversion not only keeps drives going, and therefore points on the board, but it also speaks to a QB's error rate and who is grabbing the "bully factor" on the field.
Watch for "surprise attack" gimmicks the Seahawks pull defensively on 3rd down, even showing the looks real early in the snap count. Very tough to complete 3rd downs when you cannot check off at the line.
Be Afraid,
Dr D
Comments
2
Seemed likely to happen the way things were going, just surprised it was on a holding call. The offense was very run only early but the defense has been all over everything. Lynch runs in for TD, set up by a couple good completions as I'm writing this. 11-0, presumably 12-0.
3
Just as I had hoped they identified what was working and just stuck with it. Ran the ball pretty well against a good defense. Russ and WR's seemed to be out of sync or covered well (could not tell on the tv) so Marshawn and a little Turbin was enough tonight.
Will be nice if we are fortunate enough to have our entire squad healthy and in good form later in SF.
4
49ers may well be the superior team. I haven't seen them play enough to determine that. One thing I feel pretty certain about is the Seahawks offense shot themselves in the foot most of the day against Carolina. Felt like a worst-case scenario on offense with squandered opportunities and not taking what the defense was giving them. Like a hitter refusing first base on a bunt out of stubbornness, the Seahawks offense insisted on running the ball into a stacked defense when the pass was there for the taking. I understand "establishing the running game" but quick adjustments and free points shouldn't be ignored.
If SF is shutting down Marshawn I hope we ease up on establishing it quicker than the beginning of the 3rd quarter. We kept Russell limited and partially hand-cuffed for half a season in 2012 before flourishing, surprised we still did it for half a game to set the tempo for the season.
5
SF clearly better than the Seahawks? FAIL
Crowd the salvation for the Seahawks? FAIL - the ballgame was won in the trenches
Read option obsolete in the first half of 2013, leading to big passing games? FAIL - Seahawks won on the ground, with Read Option
Seahawk secondary defeats Anquan Boldin? Hey, I got one right!
6
I thought that's what it was all about. 31% to 25%? Success
7
Niners 3-for-13 including 4th downs... turned out to be quite a leading indicator for the story on the field.
8
Sherman was asked about all of the naysayers who predicted the 49ers as the better team. He said that the analysts were thinking too hard; "What was the score the last time we played? What was the score this time? Are they dissimilar?" He said.
9
My son worships Sherman. LOL.
Some snotty reporter asked him, "the East Coast shows picked you to lose. Your reaction?"
"DID we lose? No? Oh, okay. Anybody see the game last year? Score? Not too dissimilar, right?"
Gotta love Sherman. I wonder if he isn't the league's MVP. Remember how much Deion made?
10
Beyond the trash talk and the bravado is one sharp mind. You don't get to Stanford without a brain.